65 Comp II Reflection 1 – “Remix Reflection”
Skylar Ramsey
Remix Reflection
Capital Punishment was not a subject that was on the forefront of my mind before this semester began. I’d always felt ambivalent about the death penalty; I didn’t like the idea of it, but I couldn’t bring myself to argue against it. I believed that the punishment could help those close to the victims of such odious crimes feel some sense of closure. Honestly, my initial essay was going to place capital punishment in a more favorable light, but then I remembered a certain phrase that I’d heard many years ago. It was from one of the victims of Ariel Castro— a horrid man who was responsible for the kidnapping and torture of three young girls. She’d said something along the lines of how she wanted him to stay alive so he could suffer the same way that she did, and those words truly resonated within me. I thought about her words carefully before delving into the topic, researching everything I could. There were many things that made me turn my indifference into disgust. Why should perpetrators of crimes be allowed the peacefulness of death? Why can’t those who’ve been falsely accused get a chance to prove their innocence? Why is death row overwhelmingly Black and Latino? All of these questions and more prompted me to write my essay, and I’m glad that I can explore this topic once again by creating an infographic using the information within it.
My remix was going to be a petition at first. I wanted to see capital punishment come to an end in our state of Oklahoma, but I quickly learned that getting signatures was going to be an immensely difficult task. I’d asked my Oklahoman family members and friends about their thoughts on capital punishment, and the majority of them were in favor of it. A petition with no signatures is essentially a written complaint, so I knew that I’d have to change my genre. That’s why I’m making an infographic for Oklahomans that are pro-death penalty and Oklahomans that have equivocating thoughts on the issue. Infographics present information in small, digestible chunks, which makes them very social media-friendly. That’s great for larger audiences like mine; though having a good percentage of Oklahoma’s population as my target audience is slightly daunting, they are the only people that can make this movement possible.
I can’t fit my entire argument into one small infographic, so I decided to make some cuts. My goal is to educate fellow Oklahomans, and people are more likely to listen when the topic is relatable. That’s why I’m only keeping the numerical data from my essay; capital punishment raises both humanitarian and economic concerns, and many Oklahomans can relate to at least one of these issues. I also left out information pertaining to the history of the death penalty. This is an infographic, not a classroom— the information should be easy to follow. The history of the death penalty would be too long to put into a small, informative poster, and I doubt that most people would concern themselves with things that happened in the distant past. In the age of social media, an eye-catching, brightly colored infographic with modest chunks of information is a great way to present my cause. I’ve experimented with many persuasion strategies for this assignment, and I’m satisfied with the choices I’ve made.
All things considered, I’m glad that I got the chance to explore this topic once again. It kept me on my toes, trying to understand my audience and the assignment at hand. My inceptive goal was to get others to see why I didn’t like the idea of capital punishment and why I believe we should abolish it, but then my goal eventually evolved into educating people on what capital punishment is and how it affects all of us. The project I started on three weeks ago was much different from the one that I have now— but now I know that this version of my project is both effective and persuasive. I’m eager to create the final version of my assignment and demonstrate just how much time and effort I poured into this endeavor.
